


Whatever Spins Your Engines

by Remember When (scribblemyname)



Category: Firefly
Genre: Autistic Character, Coping, Female Friendships, Friendship, Gen, chosen family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-13
Updated: 2015-09-13
Packaged: 2018-04-20 00:47:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4767257
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scribblemyname/pseuds/Remember%20When
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kaylee understands when River has her own ways of liking things, odd routines that keep her going in the middle of the mild chaos that is the 'verse on a good day. She understands because she has her own, and that's always been enough. Well... Almost enough.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Whatever Spins Your Engines

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MycroftRH](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MycroftRH/gifts).



> This is my first attempt to write about anything ASD, and the first I've started to come to grips with how it plays out in my own family. It's understated here, but I hope it feels real.

Sometimes River gets going on a path that just doesn't make any sense and may even make things bad, like when she starts tearing the labels off the food supplies.

Book tries to stop her because he's gentle and River likes him enough to not start going for the knife like she will with Jayne.

River's fingers clench tighter on the cans. Book tries to talk calming like to her, but Kaylee can see it's not really working.

Kaylee understands when River has her own ways of liking things, odd routines that keep her going in the middle of the mild chaos that is the 'verse on a good day. She understands because she has her own, and that's always been enough. Well... Almost enough.

She looks over the cans with a smile and picks up one of the stripped ones and writes 'PEACHES' directly onto its side. "I reckon we don't need the paper anyway."

Mal's eyebrows shoot upward and Zoe exchanges a glance with Inara. Book smiles, relaxing his grip over River's hand.

River alone doesn't respond, muttering to herself as she goes back to work. She doesn't seem to mind though when Kaylee picks up each can after and writes the name of its contents on the side.

* * *

From the beginning, Kaylee gets engines. They always make sense in a way that people don't. She loves people, she does, but figuring out what's going to set them off or make them unhappy isn't something she enjoys or does well. Eventually she doesn't try, just smiles and stays herself and lets them think of her what they will.

(This works fine until it's Mal that's making her cry, someone's opinion she actually cares about, but Zoe always puts a quick end to that.)

Serenity though, Serenity is wonderful. Kaylee can curl up with the ship anytime of day or night and know she's working with her hands on a ship that understands her and that she understands, and it's one place she'll always be right at home.

* * *

"Kaylee?"

"Yeah, Wash." She turns back around from rearranging her tools. She doesn't even think about it anymore, just cleans up behind folks and lets them do what they want when they're there.

But Wash is giving her that funny little look he does when he notices something she's long since given up paying attention to. "Did I mess up your system?" He gestures vaguely at the tools they were both using.

Kaylee shoots him a smile. "Nah. It's fine. I've got this."

"Okay." But Wash is one of those people. He gets those odd little habits that make the 'verse run smoother. No one messes with his dinosaurs and he doesn't mess with her tools without asking her.

* * *

Kaylee loves new things, loves new worlds and the bright sun over her head and the soft earth beneath her feet, but she doesn't think she'd ever be able to give up the great big 'verse and the stars and slinging through the sky in her beautiful Serenity to stay there.

Folks say Serenity's just a bucket of bolts, but Kaylee loves the way Serenity's walls wrap her up and the engine hums beneath her hands and the whole world makes sense when people's voices fall away and it's just her and Serenity and the few people she calls family and crew.

She gets Mal and Zoe and Inara and Wash and River and Simon and Book and even Jayne. They're her people. She likes other people, almost all people, but she prefers her little pocket of the 'verse aboard her own Serenity.

* * *

Every first morning of the week, if they're not in the middle of a heist and nothing's gone lopsided, Kaylee stops by Inara's little vessel for a cup of tea and some girl talk. It's soothing and familiar, comfortable routine she doesn't like to imagine doing without. All this talk of Inara leaving, that's something Kaylee likes to pretend isn't going to happen.

"Just for a little while, right?" she asks, a little anxious if she had to admit.

"Oh, Kaylee." Inara smiles and shakes her head. Her thoughts seem to be elsewhere as she curls fingers through Kaylee's hair. "I don't—"

"It's Mal, isn't it?" Kaylee isn't really asking though. She sips her tea like the lady she always wishes she could be and shakes her head too.

"Men are not always very intelligent," Inara says, less than cryptically.

Kaylee adds more bluntly, "The captain's a right fool if he lets you get away without even asking you to stay."

Inara catches her breath, as if she hadn't expected that, and Kaylee groans.

He didn't. He didn't even ask her to stay.

* * *

She builds herself a new routine when Inara's gone, when there's no moments of luxury and brushing each other's hair in the evenings. Kaylee always loved how soft and rich Inara's hair was, how it curled around her fingers as she ran the bristles through. She misses the tea and the soft feminine laughter and the girl talk.

It's just not the same with Zoe and River, the one she works with and the one she plays with, but she makes it work. But Kaylee needs routines and habits and comfortable baselines to work from.

She spends more time with Serenity's engines and gently trying to talk her way out of masculine visitors trying to make sure she's happy and okay, not when she isn't okay. She misses Inara, and everyone else does too, and it's all because the captain can be a downright foolish man and never say what he really feels instead of the gorram remarks he makes instead.

Not that all men aren't like that. Simon doesn't exactly know when he's about to say the worst thing ever either.

Inara used to help her with that. They used to commiserate. Now they talk over letters and it's just not the same.

* * *

Sometimes River gets going on a path that just doesn't make any sense and says things that strike a chill in Kaylee, but sometimes she's the only other one that seems to understand what Serenity's saying.

"Serenity misses her too," she says, soft and quietlike, then curls up in a small space in the engine room out of the way without touching any of the parts and tools Kaylee has strewn about for repairs.

Kaylee doesn't answer that. She clangs her wrench too hard and loud, but keeps working. She almost doesn't notice when River starts humming beneath her breath to the sound of Serenity's engines.

It's peaceful, just the two of them in the heart of the ship wrapped around them.

River understands that Kaylee has her own ways of liking things, odd routines that keep her going in the middle of the mild chaos that is the 'verse on a good day. She understands because she has her own, and that's enough.


End file.
